Free CORE Practice Test (BC, 2026): 300 Questions With Explanations

Travis Bader, Silvercore Outdoors

Silvercore's free CORE Exam Study Guide gives you 300 practice questions for the BC CORE Hunter Education exam, with an explanation on every answer, scored as you go, completely free. Find out where you actually stand before you write the real thing.

The CORE exam changed in 2025. It is now 90 questions instead of 80, and you need 68 out of 90 to pass. The biggest changes are in Laws and Regulations and Ethics, which now make up nearly a third of the exam between them. People who studied from older material are walking in and finding questions they did not expect.

A practice test is the fastest way to find out if you are ready for the current version. Reading the manual tells you what the rules are. A practice test tells you whether you actually know them. This page gives you a free one. All 300 questions of it.

Get the free CORE Exam Study Guide

The Silvercore CORE Exam Study Guide is 300 multiple-choice and true-or-false questions pulled from the same eight topic areas the real CORE exam covers: conservation, ethics, laws and regulations, outdoor safety and survival, firearms safety, animal identification, bird identification, and Indigenous Peoples and hunting in BC. Every question comes with a clear explanation, and the retakes are randomized so the bank stays useful no matter how many times you run it.

You register with your email and the whole thing is yours. No credit card, no trial, no locked content. Work through it at your own pace, get your results as you go, and find out whether you are ready or whether you have studying left to do.

Start the free CORE Exam Study Guide →

What the real CORE exam actually tests

A lot of people show up to their CORE course without a clear picture of what they are being tested on. Here is the short version.

The CORE program is the hunter education program required to hunt in British Columbia. To get your BC hunting licence, you have to pass the CORE exam. The 2025 edition is 90 questions, and you need 68 correct to pass, which works out to roughly 76%. There are two exam versions in rotation, both covering the same eight topic areas, with slightly different splits between multiple choice and true-or-false.

The question breakdown for the 2025 CORE exam:

- Conservation: 5 questions

- Ethics: 9 questions (up from 5 in the 2020 version)

- Laws and Regulations: 21 questions (up from 15 in 2020)

- Outdoor Safety and Survival: 10 questions

- Firearms Safety: 15 questions

- Animal Identification: 15 questions

- Bird Identification: 10 questions

- Indigenous Peoples and Hunting in BC: 5 questions

Laws and Regulations is by far the biggest section, and it grew the most in the 2025 update. Together with Ethics, those two areas now account for 30 of the 90 questions. If you are going to study one thing harder than everything else, that is where to start.

Why a practice test beats re-reading the handbook

The official CORE student manual lays out what the rules are. But there is a difference between reading and testing, and it matters more than most people expect.

When you reread study material, your eye slides over the parts that feel familiar. You nod along and move on. A practice test will not let you do that. It stops you cold at the gap. You miss a question on the new ethics material, or on the carcass transport regulations, and now you know exactly what to go look up.

A practice test also gets you used to the format. The real exam mixes multiple choice with true-or-false, and the wording on some of the questions is precise in ways that can trip you up if you have not seen the style before. Sitting with that format ahead of time changes how confident you feel on the day.

And it tells you when you are ready. If you can score in the high 70s or low 80s on a realistic practice test, you are in good shape for the real one. If you cannot, you have just learned that before it cost you anything.

This is why the study guide is built around explanations. Every question you miss tells you exactly what to review, and the explanation is right there when you miss it. You are not just measuring your knowledge. You are fixing it as you go.

How to use the study guide well

A few suggestions to get the most out of it.

Take it early, before you have studied much. That first run is your baseline. It shows you where your real gaps are instead of where you assume they are.

Read the explanation on every question you miss. The score is not the point on your early runs. The explanations are where the learning happens, and coming back to a missed question a few days later is the fastest way to make the material stick.

Take it like the real thing. Somewhere quiet, no phone, no manual open. The real exam is closed-book, and practising that way is the only honest measure of where you stand.

What about the Silvercore Club?

The study guide is free for everyone, no membership required. The Silvercore Club is a separate thing, $59 a year, and it is worth knowing about if you are getting into hunting: it includes $5M public liability insurance, ATT eligibility, every Silvercore online course free for Club Members (including the PAL Exam Mastery course for your firearms licence), partner discounts, and The Outpost, our members' podcast.

Start the free CORE Exam Study Guide → | Join the Silvercore Club →

A note on insurance for BC Special Area hunting

If you plan to hunt in the Fraser Valley or the Gulf Islands, BC requires you to carry public liability and property damage insurance to buy the Special Area licence:

- Gulf Islands Special Area: $100,000 minimum coverage

- Fraser Valley Special Area: $1,000,000 minimum coverage

The Silvercore Club includes $5M of public liability coverage, which is well above both thresholds. If you hunt in either Special Area, the Club membership covers the insurance requirement and you do not need a separate policy. For a lot of members who hunt the Fraser Valley, this single benefit pays for the membership several times over.

Frequently asked questions

Is the study guide really free?

Yes. All 300 questions and all the explanations. You register with your email and take it. No credit card, no trial.

Does passing the practice test mean I will pass the real CORE exam?

It is a strong signal, not a guarantee. The real exam draws from a larger question pool and has a practical firearms handling component that no online test can replicate. If you are scoring in the high 70s or low 80s on the practice test and you have done the in-person training, you are in good shape.

Do I still need to take the in-person CORE course?

Yes. The study guide is a study tool. It does not provide CORE certification and does not replace the in-person course and practical handling assessment.

How is the 2025 CORE exam different from the older version?

The 2025 exam has 90 questions instead of 80, with a 68/90 pass mark. The Ethics section grew from 5 to 9 questions, and Laws and Regulations grew from 15 to 21. The other six topic areas are the same size. If you studied from older material, the Ethics and Laws sections are where you most need to review the current version.

How long does it take?

As long as you want it to. There are 300 questions and the retakes are randomized, so you can do a short first run to get a read on where you stand, then keep working the bank until you are consistently scoring in the 80s.

What do I get with the free study guide?

300 questions covering all eight topic areas of the 2025 CORE exam, with a clear explanation on every single one, and randomized retakes so you can work the bank as many times as you need.

Do I need the Silvercore Club to get the study guide?

No. The study guide is free for everyone. The Club is about the other benefits: $5M public liability insurance (which covers the BC Special Area hunting requirements for Fraser Valley and Gulf Islands), ATT eligibility, partner discounts, and every Silvercore online course free for Club Members, including the PAL Exam Mastery course.

Is the practice test useful for hunters in other provinces?

Partly. The firearms safety, animal identification, bird identification, ethics, and conservation material is largely transferable. The Laws and Regulations section and the Indigenous Peoples and Hunting in BC section are BC-specific. If you are studying for a hunter education exam in another province, the practice test is useful for the universal material, but you will want to study your province's specific regulations from local sources.

Is the study guide current for 2026?

Yes. The questions are built from the current 2025 CORE program material and reviewed as the official material changes.

Ready?

Most people who land here have a CORE course coming up and want to know if they are ready for the written exam. Take a first run through the study guide, see where you stand, and decide from there whether you study more or show up confident.

Start the free CORE Exam Study Guide →

Silvercore has been training Canadian firearms owners and hunters since 1994. Our online practice tests and courses are used by students across the country preparing for their PAL and CORE exams. Questions about the study guide, the courses, or the Silvercore Club? Get in touch.

Travis Bader, Silvercore Outdoors

Travis is the founder of Silvercore Outdoors, an RCMP Master Instructor, and a qualified expert witness in Canadian firearms matters. Teaching CFSC and CRFSC since 1994.